WARNING: fanfiction.net reportedly purging all "explicit" fics

[fireluxlou]

Well I'm not sure if everyone remembers a quizilla where people would post stories instead of quiz's and truth or dares etc. I think that's what fanfiction tries to prevent. Also i know in the Hunger Games section people get annoyed with the 'Create your own character to enter the hunger games annual event!!!' as they feel its lazy on part of the author.

[DancingMaenid]

I think fanfiction.net is a perfect example of why it's risky to be okay with rules you don't like because you assume they'll never be enforced. They can be enforced, and when they are, this stuff happens.

The site has a reputation for being inconsistent at best when it comes to doing stuff about rules violations, so I think a lot of people got complacent and assumed their stuff would remain under the radar.

Originally Posted by veinglory

Other fanfiction sites that allow hardcore erotica are, interestingly enough, less successful--so I am not sure FF is making the wrong call. I may not like it, but it is their site and it may be their best option.

That's really interesting. What makes you say that? This is the first I've heard of sites that allow erotica being less successful, maybe because my fandom corners have always been very accepting of it, and critical of any limitations. Of course, I tend to stick around Livejournal and Archive of Our Own.

Originally Posted by heza

Where are these other "better" fanfiction archive sites? I know of this one but would like to broaden my horizons. What I like about FF.net is that it's a one-stop shop for just about any fandom, and I don't have to seek out fandom-specific archives.

Archive of Our Own is pretty decent, and is a multi-fandom archive. Their biggest problem at the moment is that their servers can have trouble dealing with the load, but I find their archive a lot easier to navigate (and post fic to) than ff.net.

While on the subject of ff.net, you guys know what I'd like to see them crack down on? People using inactive sections for random stories that don't have anything to do with it.

For example, the section for George Orwell's 1984 has a lot of generic, original dystopian stories that have nothing to do with Orwell's novel. The Jesus Christ, Superstar section is used for various religious stories and poems that have nothing to do with the musical. The section for the movie A Cinderella Story used to be used for fan fic about the Jonas Brothers, even though I don't remember them having anything to do with that movie. Though the site did eventually crack down on that.

It's really annoying, and there are already sites where people can post their original fiction and poetry.

[thebloodfiend]

I really don't see the problem. I used to be a member for a few years. Authors whose stuff got too explicit posted the "naughty" versions on adultfanfiction.net (or whatever it's called) or their websites or made them available for pdf download, and posted the links on their bio pages. As it's not an adult site, and it's against their TOS, they should remove the porn. If the only purpose of your fic is to write a lemon between your OTP (I've seen way too many of those, often badly written and quite laughable), post it on a site for erotica/porn. Otherwise, turn down the heat. I've got nothing against porn/erotica, but that's not what the site is for.

And I hated songfics, chatfics, or interactive fics where the author pretty much trolled the audience for what should happen next week. The rules are right there, in black and white, when you sign up. If it's so hard to follow them, just join deviantArt. They allow anything. Truth be told, I'm glad they're cracking down on the above^. It clogged up their site. I don't want to read about your chat conversation with Batman and your BFF who eats cupcakes (that's a true story, albeit, from another fandom -- ATLA).

[Silver-Midnight]

To someone looking for other fan fiction archives, I think it was heza, here are the ones I know of:

Archive of Our Own, which was previously mentioned.

Twilighted, obviously a Twilight-related archive but they have other sub-sections and a lot of the stuff is high quality. Link: http://www.twilighted.net/

Twiwrite, same as Twillighted, and they are also expanding their fandoms too. Again, some of it is fairly good in my opinion, or at least better than what's on FF.Net. Link: http://www.twiwrite.net/index.php

The Valent Chamber/The Chamber -- This mostly has original fiction but you will find some fan fiction here. Link: http://valentchamber.com/

Most of the other fan fiction sites I found were due to this site:

http://fanfiction-directory.com/


Hope this helps and you find something you like

[Silver-Midnight]

Hmm. Well, apparently FF.Net has a Fifty Shades Trilogy section now:

http://www.fanfiction.net/book/Fifty_Shades_Trilogy/


And while I know it's quite possible to write within that fandom and not include any of the more explicit parts that it's known for, it still feels a little weird seeing that fandom on there because the original fan fiction version was taken off due to explicit material, if I remember correctly, plus not to mention what's currently going on with the M-rated material on there. I don't know. Just thought that was interesting.

[Channy]

Originally Posted by fireluxlou

Well I'm not sure if everyone remembers a quizilla where people would post stories instead of quiz's and truth or dares etc. I think that's what fanfiction tries to prevent. Also i know in the Hunger Games section people get annoyed with the 'Create your own character to enter the hunger games annual event!!!' as they feel its lazy on part of the author.

Aha, I used to love reading those on quizilla when I was like.. 14. That takes me back. I remember a lot of them were vampire fics/quizzes too.

Originally Posted by heza

Oh, I also wanted to respond to this:

From what I understand, their "M" rating doesn't excuse the same content that an "MA" rating would according to their guidelines. And it includes sexual as well as violent content. I'm not quite clear on the dividing line, though, and I think that's very open to subjective interpretation.

Okay, thanks for clarification. Still though, they troupe seems to be cracking down on anything M rated in the first place. They're looking for violence/blood/gore too, so it still raises the question of.. why have the rating if it's not allowed to begin with?

[TTCleveland]

As stated several times above, this has always been their official policy towards such stories.

[Rhoda Nightingale]

IMO, anyone who doesn't have the sense to back up their work on multiple sources--especially if one of those sources is internet-based and run by someone Not Them--pretty much gets what's coming to them in a situation like this.

[Ralyks]

Originally Posted by DancingMaenid

Archive of Our Own is pretty decent, and is a multi-fandom archive. Their biggest problem at the moment is that their servers can have trouble dealing with the load, but I find their archive a lot easier to navigate (and post fic to) than ff.net.

Well, another problem is that you can only join by requesting an invitation and have to wait I don't know how long to get an invitation, unlike ff net where you just sign up with an e-mail and are posting within three days. I also find the pages take forever to load and sometimes don't load at all.

I have yet to find an easier to use, search, or navigate archive than ff net, and certainly no more comprehensive one. I find the difference between their T and M ratings very thin and their T rating seems to allow very little indeed - less than you'd see on a prime time TV show, but I see a wide variety of material, so I'm much confused by their rating system.

If there is a better, comprehensive fanfic site that isn't hard to use, doesn't require special invitation, and doesn't regularly greet me with anit-virus warnings, I'd love to know about it. As far as I can tell, however ff net is the best out there overall.

[DancingMaenid]

Originally Posted by skylarburris

Well, another problem is that you can only join by requesting an invitation and have to wait I don't know how long to get an invitation, unlike ff net where you just sign up with an e-mail and are posting within three days. I also find the pages take forever to load and sometimes don't load at all.

You do need an invitation, but I guess I don't see that as a huge drawback. I've seen a few complaints about people not getting theirs, but I think invitations are usually pretty forthcoming once you request one.

Also, people who are already members can get invitation codes to give out. I think I've only gotten one from them, but you can request more. Haven't tried requesting more yet, though, so I don't know how quickly they come.

I have yet to find an easier to use, search, or navigate archive than ff net, and certainly no more comprehensive one.

Eh, I've just always found ff.net to be a little hard to use. Not with small fandoms, but with large ones, I find it hard to sift through everything. I'll grant that it is better than many sites when it comes to comprehensiveness and navigation, but it's just not my preferred format, I think.

In particular, I've gotten really used to reading fan fiction on blogging sites like Livejournal, where I feel people give their story headings more description and keywords than you find on ff.net. For me, a lot of categorization is a big priority, so the more information an archive gives me about a story before I click on it, the better.

[veinglory]

I think requiring an invitation creates a psychological barrier. i got that far (some time ago) and just wandered off and never requested one. My assumption being, if they want strangers to join, they'll make registration open.

[heza]

Originally Posted by veinglory

I think requiring an invitation creates a psychological barrier. i got that far (some time ago) and just wandered off and never requested one. My assumption being, if they want strangers to join, they'll make registration open.

I can agree with that, which also makes me feel like my audience will be limited. I feel like I get more exposure at FF.net.

[shadowwalker]

I keep my profile on FFNet, but link to my webpage, where I've moved all my stuff. I just got tired of the twists and turns trying to upload new chapters, edit, etc...

[Silver-Midnight]

I agree that FanFiction.Net does have the most exposure and a lot of different fandoms. However, given what I write, I don't know if it would be wise putting stuff over there, for me at least. Meaning, would what I write be able to just enough to skate by without having to worry about it getting deleted, or is it too much and gets taken down?

I wanted to stop worrying about that. That's why I decided to post at other places mostly as my writing grew or rather, what I wanted to write changed I suppose. They took "higher ratings", so to speak. Therefore, it wasn't anything that I had to worry about. If that makes sense.

Now could I be worrying for nothing? It's possible. But I'm quite fine doing what I'm doing honestly.

I have nothing really against FF.Net, and I apologize if I gave off that idea in any way.

[wise_dec4u]

I post Trueblood fanfic on FFnet all the time. As long as I use the M rating and warn the reader about lemons galore, I haven't had any issues. I love using the site and have gotten plenty of exposure. I even post some of my original work on their sister site, though it's not as well run as FFnet.

[Bogna]

There is currently a petition (can be found here) with almost 31,000 signatures. I'm really surprised that people feel so strongly about this when there is AFF and other fandom specific sites that allow graphic content. I personally never found any of FF.net's features all that helpful.

[shadowwalker]

Originally Posted by Bogna

There is currently a petition (can be found here) with almost 31,000 signatures. I'm really surprised that people feel so strongly about this when there is AFF and other fandom specific sites that allow graphic content.

I see nothing wrong with having a more 'family-friendly' site, and as you and others have noted, there are other places the more graphic stories can be posted.

[skylark]

Originally Posted by Bogna

There is currently a petition (can be found here) with almost 31,000 signatures. I'm really surprised that people feel so strongly about this when there is AFF and other fandom specific sites that allow graphic content. I personally never found any of FF.net's features all that helpful.

You need to bear in mind that fanfiction.net has well over two million members. 31,000 signatures is less than 2%.

Having read the petition, I'd be embarrassed to put my name to it even if I sympathised. The opening spiel simply isn't true. Removing work which incorporates someone else's copyrighted song lyrics isn't the same as removing a story inspired by a song, and there's no way they've removed "anything involving sexual situations, or violence". They've removed material which is above an M rating. It's been banned there since 2002.

It's my strong suspicion that the reason most of them won't go to AFF is that they're not old enough. They quite like being able to read and write smut...but a site where you have to declare you're over 18 in order to sign up at all? That's a bigger step. That's the sort of thing which shows up on browser histories and router records. They'd much rather someone else (i.e. the fanfiction.net site owner) was the one breaking the law, because if they get caught reading or writing an MA story rated M they can always claim innocence. "But it says it's suitable for over 16s!" "But it's no more explicit than all these other stories!" "But I didn't know!"

If they're on an adult site which is only for adults, they can't claim they didn't know.

[GlobalWolf]

Originally Posted by JSSchley

I actually disagree. Fanfiction.net is supported by ad revenue, and crazy X-rated fics draw the biggest audiences and therefore the most impressions.

Actually, too many "crazy X-rated fics" might get the site's advertisers to back out. That very nearly happened to the TV Tropes wiki a few years ago. They lost Google Adsense, and nothing that they could find would replace it. The admins managed to rescue the site with a purge, but it's better not to let yourself get in that situation to begin with.

That's probably why FanFiction.net doesn't allow material with explicit content. Not that I think it's any great loss to clear out material that appeals primarily to the prurient interest, though.

[BenPanced]

If Fanfiction.net doesn't police their site for X-rated fic, they risk getting shut down by their ISP if they allow such fanfic without guidelines in place that keep it away from under 18/21's. It can be as simple as either putting up an age statement warning with "yes, I'm old enough!"/"no, I'm not!" buttons to click through or a full-on registration process. However, if they don't have something like that in place and still offer erotica/pr0n, it can lead to serious legal repercussions for the owners of the site.

[Silver-Midnight]

Originally Posted by Bogna

I'm really surprised that people feel so strongly about this when there is AFF and other fandom specific sites that allow graphic content.

That was basically the point I was trying to make really. I understand why the site is doing what they're doing, and they have a right to do it. It's their site.

However, at the same time, like I said earlier, I don't feel that, I don't know, upset or worried about it. I think FF.Net is a good site, don't get me wrong. However, at the same time, I know that there are other places where I can post stuff, especially stuff that doesn't meet their guidelines.

For the people in the bigger fandoms (for example, like Harry Potter, Twilight, Naruto, InuYasha, etc.), I'm kind of surprised by this from them. I know there are sites that accept content like that for those fandoms.

[JSSchley]

Originally Posted by GlobalWolf

Actually, too many "crazy X-rated fics" might get the site's advertisers to back out. That very nearly happened to the TV Tropes wiki a few years ago, and from just what I saw of the site, most of it was fairly tame. They lost Google Adsense, and nothing that they could find would replace it. The admins managed to rescue the site with a purge, but it's better not to let yourself get in that situation to begin with.

Which is actually my point. I was replying to the idea that it makes sense for them to undertake a purge because a few people pointed out some MA-rated stories. A purge is time intensive, and does cut audience by sending them to other sites. To undertake it because of a few hundred stories flagged by a small group doesn't make a lot of economic sense. It requires a large investment of the site owners' time and will ultimately cost them money, assuming all other things remain equal. It also gives undue power to a group of users, which is something a site owner generally does not want to do.

There are a lot of other reasons why the site needs to stay out of the explicit story business, like the one you mention. My comments are meant only by way of suggesting that perhaps the current purge is being driven by one of those.

[TheRajinski]

I'm just throwing this out there, but some of the stuff on ff.net is pretty darned twisted -- at least from what I've run into on there.

Don't particularly have a problem with it personally, but I always found it funny--especially because of the supposed rules forbidding mature content. I understand why it's not exactly kosher, considering all of the young folks who frequent the website.

They are going to need a massive task force in order to properly clean the place up. The problem is pervasive.

[nkkingston]

I haven't been by ffn in ages, but the "hundred fics flagged, random purge!" pattern isn't new for them. I think they hope that purging some of the bigger fandoms of obviously overaged stuff will scare other users into taking theirs down themselves, saving the ffn staff the bother. Repeat offenders get banned.

I've definitely still got some X rated stuff up on there, back from when it was allowed (and that's dating myself!). It's survived multiple purges mainly because my account's not active enough to get noticed.

[Bogna]

Originally Posted by nkkingston

I've definitely still got some X rated stuff up on there, back from when it was allowed (and that's dating myself!). It's survived multiple purges mainly because my account's not active enough to get noticed.

Hahaha! Me too! I don't think I've logged in to my account since 2006 or 2007. Once I heard of the new rules, I moved over to AFF and Live Journal to post my smut.